


A voyage into death

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-18
Updated: 2014-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-05 04:24:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1805194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the Reichenbach fall, Sherlock Holmes is sweeping up the remains of Moriarty's criminal web when he stumbles upon Irene Adler. Sherlock was certain that Karachi was the last place they would ever see each other in, and is determined to keep his distance, but finds that his plans are increasingly entangled. The more he pulls away, ironically, the more he is drawn back into their game. The question is, how will this all end?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. First Deductions

He turns his collar of his leather jacket up against the biting wind – a rather familiar action that is almost instinctive. It’s only then that he realizes that he is slipping back into his old ways, and he knows that doing so is dangerous, almost as dangerous as climbing onto a park bench and proclaiming his identity to everyone enjoying themselves in the park. _Not that they would care,_ he muses rather grouchily. It’s been nearly a year, and he’s in Nice for god’s sake, not London. Couples are scattered around the park, their arms wrapped around each other. They couldn't care less if a bloody bomb descended upon them, so absorbed were they in each other's lips, with each trying to rub the other's raw with all their exertions. He represses an eye roll. He knows he still needs to be careful, because the intricate web that Moriarty assembled has not been fully shredded, and before he finishes that job, he has to avoid doing stupid actions like _yelling his name_ , no matter how tempting it might be to throw caution to the wind. All the same, he rather misses the attention he could command in a crowded street in London, when he was still Sherlock Holmes and not boring William Brown. The _clever detective in the funny hat_ and not the boring man who has a penchant for leather jackets. _God,_ he gazes in slight disdain at his current leather jacket, _what would I give to have my good old coat and scarf back._ There’s something nagging at him though, and he scrolls through his thoughts to pinpoint the phrase that has sent alarm bells ringing. _The clever detective in the funny hat._ That sentence; the Woman. Why had he suddenly thought of her words?

 _Stupid,_ he curses inwardly, _I’m getting slow._ He spins around, and just catches a glimspe of a woman turning a corner, vanishing rapidly out of sight. There’s a split second of hesitation, and then he hurries after her, out of the park and into one of the narrow streets. He slows to a walk as he tails her down the street; he’s not quite certain yet that it is her, but perhaps the clenching feeling in his chest is more an indication of her identity than his deductions. 

Irene senses rather than sees that someone is following her. Spikes of fear shoot down her spine as she catalogues the person’s identity. It could be anyone really, one of her clients maybe, or even Kate. She narrows her eyes as she listens carefully to the footsteps. _Too heavy for a female_ , she realizes. Right now, she can think of a myriad of possibilities that the man following her could be, and the list of possible identities she has drawn up in her mind are flagged red. These are the people who mean harm. She draws up the faces of the people she has walked past. An image of a tall, blonde man makes a particular impression on her. She is sure she has seen him somewhere before, but she can't quite place the exact location, and that only adds to her mounting worry. Paranoia grips her tightly, and when she feels the grasp of a hand around her wrist, she lets her well-honed reflexes take over. She swings her other arm and feels it connect with flesh with a satisfying thud, before she finds both of her wrists pinned onto the rough alley wall at her back.

He winces slightly when her fist connects with his cheekbones, and he realizes he should probably have anticipated that reaction. But if he could read her that well, than she wouldn’t be _the Woman._  He tries to ignore the fact that he was probably a little too distracted by the possibility of her being _the Woman._ Sherlock Holmes, being distracted from a deduction? The idea is almost unthinkable. Somehow, however, the statement doesn't sound as solid as it should have been. Giving his head a little shake, he clears his thoughts to the back of his mind palace and focuses on the slight form in front of him. She’s dyed her hair a brilliant auburn and her blue eyes are obscured by the green contact lenses she’s wearing, but he knows those lips. The memory of them brushing against his cheek is clear as day, and it probably helps that he has replayed that scene at least a hundred times in his head. _Not now,_ he murmurs to himself, annoyed, and pushes this thought firmly into one of the rooms in his palace, and turns the lock on it. Instead, he focuses on trying to deduce what the Woman has been up to these days. Other than gleaning the information that she is still living in relative luxury, a thought that relieves him for some unknown reason, from her immaculately painted scarlet nails and the evidently new and expensive coat, he can't deduce anything else. She's her usual unreadable self, and he almost relishes the fact that at least someone is able to pose him a puzzle. _A challenge._ Someone who's not another ordinary, boring person.

 The moment she relaxes against his grip, he knows that she too, has seen through his disguise. _Clever girl,_ he thinks, _she’s almost as good as me. Almost._ He nearly smirks, but holds himself back at the last minute. He should be annoyed, really, that she has can read him so quickly and effortlessly, but he just feels a sort of pride. “Mr Holmes,” her voice is a familiar purr, and it worries him when he realizes just how much he misses it’s sound. “Is this how you seduce a girl?” Her tone is languid and teasing, painting a rather vivid contrast with the punch she just threw. “How?” He is pleased to find that his own voice is equally devoid of emotion – not _Sentiment_ , never the word _Sentiment –_ as he relinquishes his grip on her wrists. She raises a perfectly drawn eyebrow and replies nonchalantly, “Your coat collar, and also, the cheekbones are a dead giveaway.” Here, she smirks, “Look at those cheekbones, I almost regret bruising them. Then again, you should have known better. And let me guess, Mr Holmes, was it my coat that gave me away, or my shoes?” Sherlock scowls – he’s not used to being seen through easily, and he definitely does _not_ like it. “Neither, actually,” he pauses, wondering if he should admit that it was her lips. But no, that would be admitting that he remembers her lips, and worse, that would be admitting to _sentiment_. So instead, he lies. “It was your hair, actually.” Internally, he cringes. That was a rather ridiculous answer, seeing that he could read almost nothing from the loose, gleaming waves of hair that fell over her shoulders and spilled over her back. It bothers him that he can never, truly, read her. He wonders if she notices that he is lying, and schools his expression into one of boredom, one that seems to be saying, “ _of course, isn’t it obvious?”_. Lies and deception; they were just playing the game. Irene returns his expression, and he can’t tell if she has bought the lie. Instead, she pulls away from his gaze and reaches into her handbag and writes on a spare piece of paper tucked away somewhere. She presses it into his palm, then turns to continue her walk down the street. As she rounds the corner, she turns back and gives a small wave, lifting the corner of her lips ever so slightly, before disappearing.


	2. Hide and Seek

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and Irene play a game of Hide and Seek, with their feelings, with themselves, and with the world around them. In the process, they find themselves unearthing feelings and thoughts that are perhaps best left buried.

He watches her leave, ensuring that she turns the corner before he turns his gaze upon the paper she has pressed into his hand. After all, he doesn’t want to seem all that _eager_ to find out what she has written. Convinced that she isn’t coming back, he unfolds the paper. _Been in her bag for 3 days. Some sort of advertisement from the daily newspaper about a ballet._ He puts the paper to his nose and inhales. _Definitely the Woman’s. The heady, intoxicating smell that is part perfume, part Her is telltale. Same scent as the one left on his sheets after she had slept in them. It had lingered even after 5 washes and he is convinced that some nano-particles are still circulating in his room even now._ He examines the advertisment, and notices that she had written down a string of seemingly random numbers in her graceful hand, before flipping it around. There‘s absolutely nothing on the back of it though, just some words from an article that isn’t part of the puzzle, not this puzzle that he’s trying to solve anyway. He feels a sharp sense of disappointment – he was expecting something, anything, an address, or at least a way to contact her again. Unwilling to give up, _because giving up would mean that he might never see the Woman again, and –_ He pauses in his scrutiny of the scrap of paper. That would be what was best, wouldn’t it? Never seeing her again, never hearing that _voice_. He knew, with her, how dangerously he tiptoed the line that made him Sherlock Holmes. With her, it was so easy to make one wrong step and reveal that he was, behind all his ice-cool facades, human. He just needed to get rid of that piece of paper he held, and that way, he could go back to being his usual self. The world was so big, and the chance that they would meet again was probably infinitesmally small. But the Woman was a puzzle, and Sherlock Holmes could never resist a puzzle. _I’m just solving a puzzle a person left me. That’s all. No strings attached._

With that thought firmly in his mind, he turned back to the advertisment. _There’s something I’m not quite seeing here, something… something –_ His eyes land on a neatly drawn circle around a time stated in the advertisement. 1330. The time slots for the ballet performance had been printed neatly near the bottom in fine print, _no wonder_ he had almost missed it. _Yes, that’s the key to this puzzle. “_ 1.30pm, it’s a matinee show,” he murmured to himself, and checking for the date, “today. That’s where she wants to meet me again.” He frowned down at his watch. 4.30pm. That didn’t make sense. He swept the idea of the meeting at the opera out of his head and focused on the advertisment once more, his eyes sweeping the newspaper for more clues. His eyes are drawn back to the random string of numbers. 12513518949514. _A telephone number?_ Not likely, it was too long and the area code was wrong anyway. He remembers the Jumbo Jet incident, and his eyes narrow. These numbers, if arranged correctly, could code for something else. There is a click as everything falls into place. He analyses the seemingly nonsensical string. _12 5 13 5 18 9 4 9 5 14. Le Meridien. The name of a hotel._ Sliding his phone out from his pocket, he quickly does a search for the hotel. As per his expectations, there is a hotel of that name in Nice, and a smile dances across his lips quickly before he suppresses it, lest passerby take him for a mad man. The location of the hotel is in the vicinity of the park where they just met, and also, near to the Theatre de Verdure, where the ballet is being performed.

 

He is definitely right then, everything fits _perfectly._ His mind can’t resist adding in an _of course_ at the end of the sentence, and he is pleased with his deductions. _I think it was less than 5 seconds._ Her voice, cold and mocking, floats unexpectedly through his mind. It hurts, when it shouldn’t have affected him at all. Memories of the Jumbo Jet surfaces, of _her_ , walking down the aisle to him. Her _dismissing_ him, as if he didn’t matter at all. Now that he has solved the puzzle, he should stop. He knows he should throw away the slip of paper and erase the knowledge about her address, like he has done with many other facts, including those about the solar system. He doesn’t need these facts. _But he does. He needs that one fact, that one piece of information that could lead him to her._ Admitting that he wanted to find her when he didn’t need to, was that _sentiment_? And more importantly, was seeking her out worth the risk? Alone, they could blend seamlessly into crowds but _if he found her, if they stuck together_ – He stops his train of thought there. It was out of the question. He did not _want_ to be with her; he had a criminal web to destroy, and she was just a distraction. It was best to leave things lying as they were, and prevent unearthing discoveries that he’d much rather not know. _No strings attached._ He looks up, and it is with quite a hefty dose of shock that he realizes he is standing in front of the Le Meridien Hotel. He knows he must not go in, that he must not give in to temptation, but his feet move in its direction, and takes him through the doors of the very place he should not be.

 

She takes a slow bath when she reaches home. She quietly reprimands her choice of words – _no, it’s not your home, it’s a hotel._ The word home brings up memories of Belgravia, of Kate, of being Irene Adler. She feels a slight ache as she thinks of _home_ , her home that she can never return to. Soaking in the warm bath helps to take away her thoughts from these depressing feelings, and she tells herself defiantly that these feelings will disappear over time. _Time heals all wounds,_ she thinks, before catching herself wondering if this is indeed true. Seeing him today has reopened many old wounds that she believes were sealed for the better. Just looking at him brings up memories of London, of _her city,_ of her _life._ She still doesn’t really know why she gave him her address. Maybe she wants to see him again, and remember that she was once _Irene Adler, the dominatrix who brought a nation to its knees._ Maybe, she just wants to remember who she is. Sometimes, she wonders, if a person can forget who they really are if one changes ones identity once every 2 months, and settles down in a different place each time. She wonders whether she would still know the Irene Adler who wields her whips with an expert hand, who brings both men and women to their knees, whose icy mask of control never cracks, if she pretends to be someone else for too long. Perhaps she would. And sometimes, perhaps it’s best to let go.

 

A sharp knock of the door brings her to her senses, and she frowns at the rude sound. She definitely did not call for room service, and she was not expecting anyone either. Sliding into a dark blue silk dressing gown, she closes her hand around a pistol. _Just in case._ She swings the door open, and she hardly has time to react before a rough hand clamps down over her mouth and the sharp needle of a syringe sinks into her flesh. The stranger lets go, and she slumps onto the ground, the gun clattering from her hand. All she can see is the blurry image of a man, before darkness closes in around her, with an ominous finality.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't resist writing the next chapter, so here it is! Please do leave comments if you have some time!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first fanfiction I wrote specifically for this fandom, so please do drop a review if you would like me to continue writing chapters! It's not really all that fantastic, but I've always wanted to write Adlock, so please excuse my (probably very horrible) writing. Also, I hope the characters are not terribly OOC. Lots of love X
> 
> P.S. NONE OF THE CHARACTERS ARE MINE EVEN THOUGH I WISH THEY WERE


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